JOACHIM-ERNST BERENDT was born in 1922 in Berlin as the son of a pastor who was among the leading opponents of Hitler in the German Protestant Church and was killed in the concentration camp of Dachau. In 1945, at the age of 23, BERENDT was one of the founders of the Southwest German Broadcasting Company (Südwestfunk). He is the author of 33 books which have been translated into 21 languages. With a total circulation of nearly two million, his Jazz Book (Lawrence Hill Publ., New York) is considered to be the best-selling book on music ever; at colleges and universities in the U.S. it is the most widely used textbook on jazz. In 1964 BERENDT was the founder of the present-day Jazzfest Berlin and in 1967 he directed the very first World Music Festival, also in Berlin. In 1970 he organized the World Jazz Festival in Osaka followed by the Olympia Jazz Festival in 1972 in Munich. 1984 was the year of the Jazz and World Music event in the Lincoln Center, New York. The ZEIT has called him the father of the modern world music movement. On his 75th birthday the Western German Broadcasting Company WDR Köln, the German-French cultural television station Arte and many other broadcasters paid tribute to him by arranging major television concerts.
Since the late 1970s BERENDT has distinguished himself above all through his works on the "acoustic character of the world" and "the significance of hearing" - particularly in his books The World is Sound (Destiny Books, Rochester), The Third Ear (Henry Holt, New York) and I Hear, Therefore I Am (Goldmann) and the workshops, seminars and lectures he has held world-wide. BERENDT considers the primarily visual orientation of the human being, caused by modern television, to be one-sided: "it blurs and distorts our perception of the world." He pointed out that in all of the great cultures in the history of mankind, hearing - and not seeing - was considered to be the most important human sense.
Arnold Graf Keyserling: "Nobody in our century has penetrated so deeply into the miracle of hearing than Joachim-Ernst Berendt."
And André Ratti (Basler Zeitung): "Berendt is addressing people who are prepared to pose new and different questions, and are no longer satisfied with the old, worn-out answers."
German Jazz Advocate Berendt Dies
The Associated Press Friday, Feb. 4, 2000; 11:24 a.m. EST
HAMBURG, Germany:
"Joachim-Ernst Berendt, known as the 'Pope of Jazz' for his leading role promoting the American-rooted music in Germany, died Friday, a day after he was hit by a car. He was 77. A spokeswoman at the University Clinic in Hamburg confirmed that Berendt had died Friday morning. Berendt was critically injured when he was struck Thursday evening as he was walking to an event to promote his new book 'Nur Gehen', or 'Only Walking', his version of experiences with nature, said a spokesman for the music department at Suedwestrundfunk radio in Baden-Baden. Berendt co-founded the radio station, and led more that 10,000 broadcasts featuring the music he loved. He was the author of a number of works on jazz, including 'The Jazz Book', published in 1952, 'Variations of Jazz', in 1956, and 'I Hear, Therefore I Exist', in 1996. 'The Jazz Book' was translated into 18 languages and sold more than 1.5 million copies worldwide. Berendt regularly toured the United States, Japan and other countries promoting jazz. He produced some 250 long-play records for such companies as MPS, Atlantic and Electrola. A poll conducted in 1970 by the American-based music publication 'Jazz and Pop' voted him Europe's best jazz producer."
Discography
Seelenlandschaften (2005) JARO 4267-2 / Joachim-Ernst Berendt
JOACHIM-ERNST BERENDT was born in 1922 in Berlin as the son of a pastor who was among the leading opponents of Hitler in the German Protestant Church and was killed in the concentration camp of Dachau. In 1945, at the age of 23, BERENDT was one of the founders of the Southwest German Broadcasting Company (Südwestfunk). He is the author of 33 books which have been translated into 21 languages. With a total circulation of nearly two million, his Jazz Book (Lawrence Hill Publ., New York) is considered to be the best-selling book on music ever; at colleges and universities in the U.S. it is the most widely used textbook on jazz. In 1964 BERENDT was the founder of the present-day Jazzfest Berlin and in 1967 he directed the very first World Music Festival, also in Berlin. In 1970 he organized the World Jazz Festival in Osaka followed by the Olympia Jazz Festival in 1972 in Munich. 1984 was the year of the Jazz and World Music event in the Lincoln Center, New York. The ZEIT has called him the father of the modern world music movement. On his 75th birthday the Western German Broadcasting Company WDR Köln, the German-French cultural television station Arte and many other broadcasters paid tribute to him by arranging major television concerts.
